Harry Turtledove(or...Alternate History Novels)
PIcaRDMPCia
10-01-2005, 18:51
Anyone ever read any of his alternate history novels? They're simply genius in quality, and I've always loved alternate history. If you want some very good novels, go for Harry Turtledove.
Conceptualists
10-01-2005, 18:54
Anyone ever read any of his alternate history novels? They're simply genius in quality, and I've always loved alternate history. If you want some very good novels, go for Harry Turtledove.
I've never got around to reading Turtledove (always wanted to though).
Have you read either Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore or Pavane by Keith Roberts?
PIcaRDMPCia
10-01-2005, 18:56
I've never got around to reading Turtledove (always wanted to though).
Have you read either Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore or Pavane by Keith Roberts?
No, I haven't. Can you give me a quick summery of them?
Bodies Without Organs
10-01-2005, 19:00
Have you read either Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore or Pavane by Keith Roberts?
Pavanne blah-de-blah thingumajig gavagai whatsit?
Conceptualists
10-01-2005, 19:07
No, I haven't. Can you give me a quick summery of them?
Since I read both of them a whille ago, I'll use the Amazon reviews. Except slightly edited, since there is a spoiler in the review
Bring the Jubillee
Ward Moore wrote few SF novels, but Bring the Jubilee (1953) instantly became a classic of alternate history. It's the definitive story of a timeline where the South won the American Civil War--known in this different 20th century as the War of Southern Independence.
Crippled by war reparations that must be paid in gold, the 26 Northern states are seedy and run-down. Slavery, disguised as corporate indenture, is commonplace for whites as well as blacks. There's no worse insult than "Dirty Abolitionist". Life goes on as always, and 1938 New York has a certain provincial charm, swarming with bicycles and horse-drawn carts, while dirigibles float over skyscrapers of 14 or even 15 storeys, and telegraph wires are ...
a reminder that no urban family with pretensions to gentility would be without the clacking instrument in the parlor, that every child learned the Morse code before he could read.
Newly arrived from the sticks, Hodge Backmaker picks up an education as apprentice to a cynical printer who supports the underground "Grand Army" (the North hopes to rise again). Eventually our hero, a self-taught historian, joins an eccentric community of scholars and has a turbulent affair with a brilliant female physicist working on the mysteries of Time.
From www.amazon.co.uk
Pavane
Elizabeth I was assassinated by a Catholic, and the Spanish armada was a success. England remained a Catholic state and eventually protestantism was completely erradicated. The Vatican, under a consolidated Europe reighns supreme, and has a strict control on sciences and technology. The 13 colonies are still the property of Britain.
Conceptualists
10-01-2005, 19:08
Pavanne isn't technically an alt-history novel, though, is it?
You've ruined the surprise now.
Bodies Without Organs
10-01-2005, 19:35
...
Edit time, I guess.
http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=7910112&postcount=4
New Shiron
10-01-2005, 19:55
SM Stirlings Draka series, and his World out of Time series are outstanding alternate histories, and I like his characters better.....
PIcaRDMPCia
10-01-2005, 21:26
iBump now engaged. Please try your post again.
Von Witzleben
10-01-2005, 22:16
No. I haven't.